Project Moo
Obsolete: With the latest update on 12/03/14, this project is no longer necessary, as the new Ribbon tool can be used to gauge exactly what value different actions have on produce production. Summer 20th Final Values: Group A (3 cows who were fully cared for 40 days): $2400 (+$400, or +$5 per action per day) Group B (3 cows who were groomed daily for 40 days): $2195 (looks like I missed a day of grooming) Group C (3 cows who were talked to daily for 40 days): $2205 (looks like I found it!) Group D (3 cows who were ignored daily for 40 days): $2000 (no gain in value) Group E (3 cows who were neglected daily for 40 days): $2000 (so milking / not milking has no effect) Group F (3 cows treated as Group A, but one day behind): $2380 (looks like I missed a day here, too) And the cleanup: Cows Sold For: $39,545 Trough Total: 100 @ $500 each / $50,000 (note, at 24 a day maximum sell capacity, it took me 5 days JUST to even sell all these back.) Hay Seed Total: 9 Stacks of 9 (I thought I was gonna need more >.>) @ 27.5 each = $2227.5 Hay Total: 1865 @ $5 each = $9325 (notice: clearing hay is annoying, you can sickle it down over and over again and it just springs right back up the next day. Turns out, you have to wait until it's fully grown and then HAMMER it down, one at a time, to clear it out.) Tools: $2550 total Profit: Enough to buy the large upgrade (btw, 12x12 increase) with $58k left over! Woohoo! Project Moo is an attempt to gather definitive data on cow rearing, and how different treatment affects their production. The project will consist of 18 cows, broken down into six separate groups: A: 3 starting on Spring 1st, who will get groomed and talked to every day. B: 3 starting on Spring 1st, who will get groomed daily. C: 3 starting on Spring 1st, who will get talked to daily. D: 3 starting on Spring 1st, who will be neglected daily. E: 3 starting on Spring 1st, who will be ignored daily (won't even milk them except for perioidical checks on their production.) F: 3 starting on Spring 2nd, who will get groomed and talked to every day. I figure this will resolve a few questions, namely the impact on whether interaction will have any effect on animal produce (groups A, B, C, D, and E), which interactions have the most effect if any (groups B, C, D, and E), whether elapsed time or total time determines growth (groups A and F), etcetera... Further, if there is any randomness, having three test subjects per grouping should be useful for ferreting that out. (As it may be assumed with reasonable confidence that if growth is even mildly random (>5%), at least ONE of the eighteen cows will trigger its growth on a later date than the other two in its cell.) What this project will not be covering is other livestock (although I've heard a rumor that sheep and cows are on the same growth timer, I cannot confirm it). However, there is another smaller scale project ongoing that is checking out sheep and chickens, and should be interesting. I expectimate this project to run about three years in game (180 days total), since there are folk out there with gold producing animals on their fourth year, and even the quickest animal herder probably didn't have large livestock within their first two months. With that in mind, I have in reserve about 500 hay, with a reasonably large section of my plot set aside to harvest the remaining ~2700 hay I'll need (at a minimum of 54 every three day, my 20x4 farm should get me through each subsequent winter as well), and a growing stockpile of troughs (60 and counting, need at least 360 though to feed them for a full month at a time) So, with those values at hand, Project Moo will begin in approximately 4 in game days, and I'll be keeping a daily log here of the progress. Down below is the verbose charts, while the At A Glance table immediately after this section is intended for people just skimming for results. Legend: S = Small Milk, M = Medium Milk, L = Large Milk, G = Gold Milk. * Off to a good start, accidentally placed down the F group a day early. Ah well, didn't brush, talk, or milk them the first day, hopefully it doesn't mess anything up. ** All it takes is one misclick, and you brush Cow #3 from Group C after talking to him. * Interestingly, the three cows of F group took a day longer than predicted to grow into Medium Milk. Since my daily take has been consistently 15 milk (18 on days that I milk group E), I don't believe I missed a day milking them, and since it affected all three, I suspect that I either forgot to groom them on a given day, or forgot to talk to them on a given day.